Sunday, January 11, 2009

January 11th, 2009

It's a quiet day for me today, as I am home with Matthew who is suffering from a sore tummy. It's nothing serious (though he's clearly uncomfortable), but he didn't feel up to the venture downtown that was planned. Rich has taken the other four kids with him as he tries to find both a store and the appropriate Portuguese words to ask for access to a specific disk he needs (which he left at home by mistake) to fix his laptop. I hope he can get what he needs, as a dead computer will put him behind in the work he needs to get done. Worst case scenario, we can get someone from back home to locate and mail off the disk he needs, but that wouldn't be a quick fix.

Yesterday was nice. We set out to see what little shops and stores lined the main street in our little town. It wasn't too sunny, but we soon learned it was still very warm! Many shops were closed, as it was Saturday, but there were a few open. We enjoyed an interesting lunch at a convenience store/restaurant along the way. Six of us ordered a hamburger (for old times sake....) while Jillian ordered a hot dog. What we got was tasty, but different. The hamburger bun filled the entire face of the large dinner plate it came on, and had also been fried on the outside a bit. Inside was some tasty sauce and a very flat but large in diameter hamburger patty wrapped up in a ton of cheese. Very naughty but also tasty! Jillian's hot dog was sliced down the middle length-wise, sleeping in a lot of tomato sauce, and nestled in with some carrots and corn. An odd choice to accompany a hot dog, but not unusual here.

After lunch, we stocked up at the local grocery store, as we have learned EVERYTHING closes up on Sunday (minus that American style grocery store we found last week “Angelino's”).

As we were coming home from the grocery store, we were wandering up our little dirt road. Emily, Matthew and Jillian wanted to run ahead, so we let them lead by about the length of three power poles. At that point, they were to stop and wait for us. Matthew and Emily took off like a shot with Jillian right at their heels. They passed the first pole... no problem. The older two widened the gap and were passing the second pole while Jillian was still a few yards behind. When out of a side yard, two dogs ran out and started growling and barking at little Jillian. With both her siblings ahead of her, and her parents and remaining siblings behind her, she was all alone with two angry dogs staring her down. We are grateful she didn't react by running away. Instead, she stood there screaming which may have been a part of why the dogs didn't actually harm her. The moment we saw the two dogs barking at Jillian, we all ran towards her which was enough to scare away the dogs. Apparently the dogs only feel brave when their prey is shorter than they are. Rich scooped up an extremely shaken up Jillian, and carried her the balance of the way home. We loved her up well, lauding her for not running away (there is a high probability the dogs would have given chase and attacked...), and talked about how it's likely best to stay right close to us on the streets from now on. There was no need to convince her of value this new rule... We're grateful no harm came to her.

Speaking of loving people up... I should go be with Matthew. He's still uncomfortable and could use some momma' cuddling.